It’s holiday time once again. Most cultures tend to celebrate something around this time of year. We in the USA tend to think of this as Christmastime, or possibly Hannukah (Chanukkah? Never been sure on that one) time, depending on what shape the building was when your parents took you there once a year as a kid. Either way, it’s a grand celebration of snowmen, jingling bells, compulsory gift-giving, soulless consumption, excess, and being dicks to retail workers. Oh, and sometimes something religion-oriented happens, depending. Suffice it to say, if we’re going to spend a quarter of every year swaddled in the trappings of "the holidays," we ought to look at some of the more unusual things which transpire around this time in various places around the world. Let’s go!
Not ranked in any particular order.
You’ve probably heard of this one, but if you haven’t, Krampus is one of Santa’s helpers, though not in the cheerful way one might think when hearing of one of Santa’s helpers. In Alpine nations, the story goes that when Santa/Saint Nick/whatever goes out to dispense gifts to good little girls and boys, he brings Krampus along with him. Krampus is described as looking like a demon of sorts, covered in coarse hair, with horns on his head and the cloven hooves of a goat for feet. He carries chains (which whimsically have sleigh bells attached to them) and serves to punish the bad children. You see, Santa/Nick is a jovial fellow and can do no harm. Thus, he subcontracts that job to Krampus, so he’s kind of like the Blackwater of Christmas. Plausible deniability. "Santa would never hurt you! Ho ho ho! That’s why Santa brought Krampus with him, ho ho ho!" Upon entering a house, Santa checks his famous list, and if the kids are bad, he gives the nod to Krampus, who beats them with birch rods to let the little brats know that Christmas ain’t no joke. Coal? Nah. Beatings by a goat creature are what gets it done. If you’re in Austria during the holidays, you can expect to see people running around in Krampus masks, playing pranks on others.
In Japan, due to some clever marketing back in the 1970s, there is a tradition of getting KFC for Christmas. Yup, KF-fucking-C. For you (KF) see, the marketing pushes the exclusive-to-Japan "Christmas Bucket," which features the famous chicken, of course, as well as salads, cakes, pies, and other items, for a complete Xmas meal. And this isn’t a weird one-off thing. KFC franchises in Japan do 10x of their typical business between the 20th through the 25th, with the 24th being the busiest day. On the 24th alone last year, KFC Japan made 6.9 billion yen (or 65 million US dollars) in just that day’s sales. Also, if you pay a special fee, you can get a man dressed up like Colonel Sanders in a Santa suit to deliver your meal. Christmas isn’t a formal holiday in Japan, as they’re mostly Shinto or Buddhist, with only a small portion being Christians, so they’re not even pretending it’s about anything but excuses to eat. In a recent poll, it was found that some 3.6 million Japanese eat KFC for Xmas, and many reserve their "Kentucky Christmas" well in advance, as lines stretch around the block starting the 23rd. From the simple slogan "Kurisumasu ni wa kentakkii!" (It’s Kentucky for Christmas!) spawned a unique tradition that only the Japanese could really pull off.
In Italy, Santa doesn’t do all the heavy lifting. Indeed, long after he’s come and gone, a witch shows up on the 5th of January to pick up the spirits of the kids, who leave their stockings up for this purpose. The old witch, named Befana, also glides down the chimney and leaves candies, fruits, liquors, and wine for the good kids—and rotten potatoes or onions for the bad kids. Damn. Italian kids really have an incentive to be good. She’s described as the almost stereotypical witch, down to the big nose and riding on a broomstick, which she’ll whack you with if you see her, as she ostensibly does not like being viewed. The history of this character is a lady who met the Three Wise Men (or Magi) of Christian myth when those fools were lookin’ for Jesus. They asked her if she knew "where the son of God was," and she was like, "uh... the what, now?" but being good-natured, she put them up for the evening. Upon their departure, they asked Befana if she wanted to come along, which she declined, citing housework to be done. The story says she changed her mind later and went looking for the guys but couldn’t find them, and decided to take up freelance gift-giving. Families leave wine and pasta for Befana, much like Santa gets milk and cookies, but ya know, this is Italy we’re talking about.
In Iceland, where everything is at least a little fucked-up, they’ve got the Yule Cat, whose name in Icelandic is this Nordic mess: Jólakötturinn, so we’ll just call him the Yule Cat. The Yule Cat is a very large cat, basically a housecat, but scaled up to be as large as an elephant, and his purpose is not to give gifts or any such thing, but instead, to viciously maul and devour anyone who hasn’t gotten new clothes to wear before Christmas Eve. Yup. He’s the fashion police. It’s thought that this creature was supposed to motivate farmers to process the autumn wool harvest before Christmas, as those who helped would have new clothes, and those who didn’t, well...you don’t make the hat, you get mauled by the cat.
It all starts with the Christmas tree. Where exactly that particular tradition came from is a matter of some debate among...Christmas bullshit scholars or something. They’ve mostly concluded that the whole drag-a-tree-into-the-living-room-and-cover-it-with-crap deal started in Germany way back in the 16th century. Naturally, as happens when people start emigrating to the USA (once that became a thing), they bring their traditions with them. When the Germans came, they brought all manner of interesting things, including Xmas trees. However, we seem to have been spared the tree pickle. What’s the tree pickle? Well, Germans, loving anything brine-cured or fermented, decided that it’d be fun to hide a pickle in the ol’ Christmas tree and make kids try to find it. The kid who finds it, well, gets to eat the pickle but also gets a small gift for finding said pickle. This has led to a number of various pickle-camouflaging techniques, lest the kids find them too easily. Modern incarnations involve pickle-shaped ornaments rather than brined cucumbers, so I guess they don’t eat them anymore. Well, perhaps they do, but I wouldn’t want to take that dump.
No, not eggnog. I kind of like eggnog. It’s my second-favorite nog, and it’s a perfect metaphor for the holidays: a little goes a long way, but it’s around for months, and once you’ve had your fill, it lingers until it has overstayed its welcome.
The things I’m actually referring to are the "fun" holiday beverages that various drink companies foist upon an unwitting public. Kroger and its gaggle of subsidiaries have candy cane soda and cinnamon roll soda from its store brand offering, value-priced at $1.49 (plus deposit) for two liters, which is still probably too much, both in cost and in quantity. This year, the anarchists at Mountain Dew have decided to bestow upon the public a fruitcake-flavored version of its sugary caffeine fluid. It is called "Fruitquake," and the slogan for this substance is "not your traditional fruitcake." Ya, don’t say. I don’t think traditional fruitcake comes in 24-ounce EZ-chug bottles.
There are many, many others in this genre, such as Jones Soda’s "holiday box," which has sodas flavored like turkey, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie, etcetera. Though, at least the Jones people know it’s more-or-less a gag (possibly literally) gift and not to be taken seriously. The last one I’ll touch upon for this year is Red Bull’s entry: Fig Apple energy sauce. I don’t know if that’s a bad flavor combo or what, but come on, guys, why would you pick something that can be truncated to "fapple?" Go brave the horrors of your local grocer’s drink aisle, and you’ll find some interesting stuff this time of year.
Those are some holiday oddities for you. There are many, many more out there, but I only get so much room. Look forward to part two next year, Weirdmas II: Electric Weirdaloo.
Merry Xmas, chappy Chanukah, kwazy Kwanzaa, bitchin’ Bodhi day, and a...reasonably pleasant Tohji-Taisai, for my Shinto peeps. May you survive the holidays intact and more-or-less sane.
—Wombstretcha
Wombstretcha the Magnificent is a gross soda enthusiast, Yule Catnip farmer, Kentucky Colonel, writer, and retired rapper from Portland, Oregon. He can be found at Wombstretcha.com, on Twitter as @Wombstretcha503 and on Facebook (boo!) and MeWe (yay!) as "Wombstretcha The Magniflcent."
